Erin was startled by his mention of Angela. She probably shouldn’t have been. She hadn’t known Angela herself; they had only met a couple of times. But from what the others had said, Angela had been a sort of emotional blackmailer, holding power over those whose secrets and weaknesses she was able to ferret out. But Angela’s secrets didn’t keep her safe. Eventually, Gema had bent under the pressure, poisoning her and directing suspicion at Erin.
“Just like Gema,” Erin said. “Angela just didn’t know when to stop.”
Roger’s wide eyes got bigger still. “What do you know about Gema?” he demanded.
“Oh, not a lot.” Erin gave her arm an experimental tug, just a little one, to see if he would let her go. He held on firmly. “I met her when I moved to town, but I didn’t really get to know her. She killed Angela because she had found out about Gema’s baby, the one she had out of wedlock, and was holding it over her.”
Roger’s grip tightened. “You know about the baby?”
Erin winced at the increased pressure. She pried at his fingers with her free hand. “Ow, Roger. You’re hurting. Please let me go.”
“How do you know about the baby?”
“From Gema. I saw her and her daughter at the store. I didn’t realize it, but Gema thought I did and that I was trying to blackmail her. I didn’t know until after everything was over that she’d been afraid of people finding out about her daughter.”
“You can’t know about that,” he protested, his voice hoarse. “No one can know about that.”
“It all came out after Gema was arrested. Everyone knows.”
“Not Mary Lou. No.”
Erin stared at him. “Mary Lou knows.”
Roger shoved Erin into a tree. Her head slammed back into it and she saw stars. The bark of the tree was rough against her back, even through her shirt. Her head whirling. She tried to sort everything out. Clearly, she was not having success in keeping Roger calm, and there was something about Gema’s secret baby that disturbed him greatly.
“No,” Erin said, reversing her position, “Mary Lou doesn’t know.” Roger’s grip relaxed just the tiniest bit. “Mary Lou doesn’t know anything about Gema’s baby.”
“No,” Roger agreed, his thin shoulders lowering a little.
“Nobody knows,” Erin soothed.
“You know.”
“I only knew that Gema had a baby. I don’t know anything about it. I just moved to Bald Eagle Falls. I barely knew Gema.”
“But you lived here then.”
“No. I just moved here last year.”
Roger pressed Erin more tightly against the tree. He put his forearm under her chin and pressed it against her throat.
“I remember you. You know what happened.”
“I don’t know. I’m sorry I said something to upset you. I was just joking around. Really. I didn’t mean to upset you. Everybody has secrets. You are entitled to yours.”
For a moment he relaxed the pressure on Erin’s throat. Then his expression hardened. “Yes. My secrets. No one else can know.”
He pressed his arm into her, cutting off her air. It was too late to decide that she should have screamed for help when all he was doing was holding onto her arm. Instead she had just stood there, trying to talk him down, not taking any direct action. She should have screamed, kicked him, wrestled away from him. He didn’t look that strong. If she hadn’t been in such a vulnerable position, maybe she could have fought him off. But she’d waited until his arm was cutting off her air before considering herself in any real danger.
“No one,” Roger repeated.
Chapter 30
Erin heard a shout, but it was far away and too indistinct to make out what he was saying. Roger didn’t withdraw his arm, staring into Erin’s eyes and waiting for her to lose consciousness.
“Go! Get him!”
There was a crashing as someone charged through the bush toward them, and then Roger let out a howl and released Erin. She clung to the tree behind her, trying to keep her feet. Roger was screaming and fighting with someone. As Erin drew in oxygen and her brain started to work again, she heard Terry shouting at Roger to get down and lie still and, when he finally did, Erin heard the ratcheting of handcuffs as Roger was secured. She blinked, trying to bring the world around her back into focus. Terry was leaning over Roger, who lay on the ground whimpering. Terry left him there, taking Erin into his arms.
“Are you okay? You need medical attention. Sit down. Can you breathe?” He fired questions and commands at her too fast for her to be able to sort out an answer and respond.
While Erin wanted to stay on her feet, he helped her sit down, his hands gentle. “Just relax, Erin, take deep breaths. Tell me if you think you’re going to faint. I’m going to call for help.”
Erin nodded.
“What happened?” Terry questioned, while he waited for the dispatcher to answer his call. “I’ve seen Roger get agitated, but never violent.”
Before Erin could answer, he was talking to the dispatcher, relaying the best he could what had happened and asking them to send back up and get an ambulance if one were available. He terminated the call, checked on Roger, and returned to Erin, taking her pulse.
“I’m okay,” Erin told him.
“Are you sure?”
She nodded. “Thank goodness you got there when you did.” She swallowed, which hurt, and took a deep breath, which also hurt. “He’s the poisoner.”
Terry was looking back at Roger. “What?”
“Roger. He’s the poisoner. He’s the one who killed Joelle and tried to poison me.”
“Roger? Why would Roger do that?”
“He had a secret. She was trying to blackmail him, and he couldn’t pay her off. She said she was going to tell Mary Lou about… the secret.”
Terry looked like he was about to ask another question, then stopped. “Oh.”
“Oh?” Erin looked at him. “Oh? You make it sound like you already knew that. Like maybe this wasn’t such a big surprise for you.”
“I may… know his secret. And how Joelle found out about it.”
“How?” Erin already figured she knew Roger’s secret, but she didn’t know how Joelle knew about it. How would Joelle, who hadn’t ever lived in Bald Eagle Falls, know what had happened twenty years before? “Was it Davis? Did he tell her?”
“I don’t think so. It’s possible, but I don’t think that’s how.” Terry hesitated. “I’m not on the case, though, so I should probably let the sheriff fill you in on the details. I only know the broad strokes. He’ll be able to provide more details. Whatever he feels is prudent to share.”
“Terry!”
“Sorry. You’ll have to wait.”
K9 nosed at Erin, whining and looking concerned over her strange behavior. She didn’t normally sit around in the middle of the woods, and he wanted to know what was going on. Erin scratched his ears, something she also would not normally have done while he was on duty.
“Who’s a good dog? That was you, wasn’t it? You’re the one who took Roger down.”
“That’s right,” Terry answered for K9, who sat back on his haunches and panted proudly. “It was remarkably effective. He doesn’t usually get to do that!”
“Is Roger okay?”
Terry shook his head. “You’re too kind for your own good. The man tried to kill you and you want to know if he’s okay? Just like you try to take Joelle soup and nurse her back to health when you know she pretty near killed you.”
“I know. I shouldn’t feel bad for him, but I do. I don’t think… I don’t think this is the kind of person he was, before his accident. I don’t think he would have attacked anyone, the way he used to be.”
She had only heard a few words here and there about Roger Cox and how he had been before his failed suicide attempt, but she gathered he had been quite gentle and unassuming. Not the best provider, but he had worked hard and done his best, and been a good husband and father. Except for one major failing.
<
br /> “Is he the father of Gema’s baby?” Erin asked.
“Did he tell you that?” Terry asked.
“Not exactly. But from what he said, I think he was.”
“It was a long time ago. I gather Gema was separated from her husband, but Roger and Mary Lou were together. I don’t think anyone ever guessed who the father was.”
“No. That’s why he killed Joelle. He didn’t want it getting back to Mary Lou. Nothing was more important than keeping that a secret from her.”
“And now it will all come out. As if the woman hasn’t already had enough to deal with.”
“What’s going to happen to Roger? If he couldn’t help it, because of his brain injury…”
“They’ll still lock him up. You can’t let someone who is a danger like that wander around where he could hurt someone. I don’t know why he’s out wandering now. Mary Lou promised they would keep better track of him. Not because we were worried about the public, but we wanted to make sure that Roger himself was safe. We didn’t want him getting lost…”
“You don’t think anything has happened to Mary Lou, do you?”
Terry considered. “I hope not. One of us will have to go make sure, after we get this dealt with. You are the equivalent of a five-alarm fire for our little department.”
As if on cue, Erin could hear sirens approaching. The police cars probably didn’t actually need their sirens on to get through Bald Eagle Falls rush hour, but they so rarely got to use them, they were taking advantage of the opportunity.
Tom Baker and Sheriff Wilmot arrived. Tom was instructed to take Roger in, but Terry held up his hand.
“He might be hurt. K9 took him down. Check him out before you take him anywhere, and then he should probably go to the hospital. Even if he’s unhurt, he’s going to have to go through some kind of evaluation—” Terry looked at Erin, “—to see how culpable he is in the commission of a crime.”
Tom’s mouth hung open. “What did he do?”
“Well, you know he attacked Miss Price. But it would appear he’s also our poisoner. He’s the one who killed Joelle Biggs and attempted to poison Erin.”
“How do you know that?” the sheriff asked sharply.
Terry motioned to Erin, indicating she should explain.
“He told me that he’s the one who treated Joelle’s leg,” Erin said, “he had to get rid of her to keep his secret.”
“Is that a fact?” Sheriff Wilmot thought about this. He looked at Terry. “I guess that answers our question.”
Erin frowned, trying to interpret the look that passed between them. “What question is that? Do you mean the identity of the killer? Or something else?”
The sheriff raised one eyebrow at Terry. “You didn’t tell her?”
“I figure that’s your job.”
“Well.” Sheriff Wilmot seemed pleased to be given the opportunity. “We found some interesting things when we searched Joelle’s cottage. One of them was a diary written by your Aunt Clementine.”
Erin blinked at him. She tried to get up to talk to him face-to-face. Terry wouldn’t let her rise. “Stay there. Just relax.”
Sheriff Wilmot bent lower to converse with Erin.
“Clementine’s missing diary?” Erin demanded. “Joelle had it?”
“She did. I guess she or Davis must have stolen it sometime around the house fire.”
“Clementine’s diary! But why did they take it? It didn’t have anything in it about Davis and Trenton, did it? Clementine never actually figured out what had happened to Adam Plaint.”
“No. But it seems like it was a very tumultuous time in Bald Eagle Falls. Adam Plaint’s disappearance, your parents and their accident. Your aunt seemed to be a confidante to a lot of people. The old woman with the tea shop… she must have been a good listener. Sympathetic, like you. So people told her things. And while she kept their secrets, some little bits and pieces did make it into the journal.”
“Like Gema Reed having someone else’s baby?”
“She went away on an extended vacation. Seeing all of the sights she’d always wanted to go to. When she came back to Bald Eagle Falls, she went back to her husband, and no one in town knew that she had gone away to have a baby. Or almost nobody. She did confide in somebody.”
“Clementine.”
Sheriff Wilmot nodded. “I assume Joelle and Davis took the diary because Davis was afraid it would implicate him in your father’s death. But one of them decided to put it to use and see if they could extort money out of the townspeople to keep their secrets from coming to light.”
Erin leaned back against the tree, closing her eyes. “Who would ever have guessed?” She looked from Sheriff Wilmot to Terry. “Did either of you ever guess that Roger was the one who had made the poultice for Joelle’s leg? It never even occurred to me that it might be a man. That goes to show you how prejudiced I am!”
“Maybe we should have guessed,” Terry said. “Given what we knew about how else he was spending his time.”
Erin frowned, trying to figure out what else Roger might have been doing. “Maybe’s it’s just the lack of oxygen, but… what do you mean?”
“I mean his occupation. You did know, didn’t you?”
Roger’s occupation as the maker of the Jam Lady jams.
“Oh, that. Yes. I guess he was a little more… domestic than most men in Bald Eagle Falls. And why couldn’t he be a healer? Lots of men are doctors. Why not herbalists? He said his grandmother taught him.”
“I don’t know anything about his grandmother,” Sheriff Wilmot said. “I’ll have to ask around. She was probably well known; but as you say, it’s easy to assume that a poisoner and practitioner of herbal medicine would be a woman rather than a man. He did surprise us on that note.”
They watched as Tom, having finished his examination of Roger, helped him to his feet and then escorted him to one of the waiting vehicles. Erin watched him drive away.
“Poor Mary Lou.”
Epilogue
It was starting to get dark out, but Erin wasn’t ready to go back into the house and turn in for the night. She was enjoying the company of Vic and Adele on the back porch and she didn’t want the evening to end. It felt good to just relax with them and not worry about a murderer. The next day, she needed to be at the bakery bright and early. She had a new recipe for strawberry muffins to try out.
Adele heard the footsteps first. She went still, then got up and looked around the side of the house to see who was approaching.
“Who is it?” Erin asked. She took another sip of her mint tea, too lazy to get up and see for herself.
But in another minute, Mary Lou was there, gliding smoothly over the sidewalk as if she were on wheels. She looked at the three of them, her smile strained.
“Hello, ladies. Nice to see everyone this beautiful evening.”
“How are you?” Erin got up to squeeze Mary Lou’s hand and pat her shoulder comfortingly. “How are you and your boys holding out?”
“Oh, we’re managing. As horrible as the whole thing is… at least I’m not up half the night trying to settle Roger and get him to stay in bed.”
“That must have been so hard. I was worried about you.”
“I wasn’t myself, and I must apologize for that. I was very impatient and irritable…”
“Lack of sleep will do that to you,” Vic said.
“It certainly will.”
“I guess now we know what was bothering him,” Adele said.
Mary Lou nodded. “I wish he had just told me. There was no need… for any of this.”
Erin frowned, studying Mary Lou’s face. “You already knew?”
“Not about the blackmail, no. But I did know… that he’d been unfaithful. I never confronted him. I never knew about the baby; Gema went away, and everything went back to normal. I was content to leave it at that and go on with our lives.”
Erin tried to fathom how difficult it must have been to put her spouse’s unfaithfulness behin
d her, never confronting him or making any reference to it.
“It’s easier to bury something like that than you think,” Mary Lou said, apparently reading Erin’s face. “We went on to have two lovely boys and lived a happy domestic life… until the investment with Angela tanked. Since then…” She sighed. “We’ve had our share of challenges.”
“I think that’s the understatement of the century,” Vic declared. “Y’all have been through H-E-double-toothpicks, if you ask me. I’m amazed you can keep a smile on your face.”
“Well, thank you, Vic. It hasn’t been easy. But I firmly believe the Lord doesn’t give us anything we can’t handle.”
Erin couldn’t help shaking her head. Roger had clearly been given more than he could handle it, even if his wife could. He’d attempted suicide, had killed Joelle, and had twice tried to kill Erin. If that wasn’t a man pushed past his capacity, she didn’t know who was.
“The Lord gives us strength,” Mary Lou said firmly.
“What’s going to happen to Roger?” Vic asked tentatively. “Do you have any idea?”
“They’re doing all kinds of tests. All of those tests that they said weren’t necessary and were just too expensive after his accident. They’re saying all of the things I have been telling the doctors all along. He can’t control his impulses. He gets agitated and overwhelmed. To talk to him in a normal conversation, you wouldn’t think there was anything wrong. Maybe some hesitation in his speech. Some language issues. But dealing with him when he’s tired or upset… he’s a completely different person.” Mary Lou sighed. “Now they agree with me. Now they say there’s reason for concern.”
Erin bit off a laugh. “I’m sorry. It’s not funny. It’s… tragic. They wait until after he’s killed someone to admit there’s a problem?”
“I want you to know that I didn’t foresee this,” Mary Lou said. “Especially you, Erin… if I had thought he was a danger to anyone but himself… I don’t know what I would have done. But something. I would have gotten him admitted… warned people. When Joelle died, I had no idea he’d had anything to do with it. He never said he’d seen her or talked to her. I had no idea.”
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